Normal
by LunalitSol
Summary: Dylan has always tried to be normal. Now, at thirty-five, it's more of a struggle than ever.


Disclaimer: Not contributing to the redundancy of stating how I don't own this when, to be frank, should not the word "disclaimer" speak for itself? ...Precisely....

Normal by LunalitSol

"I like what I hear as a resulting combination of these two strands... something of a combination of familiarity and, for lack of a better word, strangeness."  
---Alex North

"It seems important to find ways of reminding ourselves that most "familiarity" is meditated and delusive."  
---David Foster Wallace

Chapter 1:_ Tattered Delusions and dusty afghans_

Dylan had spent his whole life shunning the abnormal, only to find himself immersed in its frigid tide, drowning in it, time and time again. So it was no surprise when he read the words "abnormal growths and what they mean" on the pamphlet the doctor handed him.

He was a man now, at the ripe old age of thirty five. He had a wife, a career, and five kids of his own. He was an investment banker. His wife was a lawyer. His children were seven, nine, twelve, and sixteen respectively. Dylan and his wife had also adopted a child, a boy of fourteen now. Their names were, from youngest to oldest, Addison, Bailey, Jack, Trevor, and Sophia. His wife, Elizabeth, was a picturesque beauty, but one that could fade easily into the background, absorbed in the humdrum bustle of the everyday world around them. At a glance, his efforts had not been in vain. Dylan seemed to be the epitome of normal. Unfortunately, seemed did not equate to was.

Then, Marnie came to visit and the comfortable blanket of normalcy was instantaneously evanesced. She reveled in telling the kids all sorts of tales about Halloweentown, and they soaked it up. Sophia, at sixteen, was, for all intents and purposes, a witch. She took after Sophie in both manner and magic. Elizabeth had been less than thrilled with this. Like Dylan himself, she enjoyed a quiet, normal routine. Lizzy basked in the familiar. Fortunately, she was also not one to fight and so swiftly acclimated to the situation. It was for this reason that their son, Jack, was in training, and Bailey and Addison were both learning bits and pieces of their birthright. Much as Dylan loved normalcy, he wouldn't risk estrangement with his kids in order to accomplish it the way his own mother had. She'd gotten lucky on that one.

Trevor, their adopted son, was a different story. He was Sophie's son. She was murdered shortly after his third birthday and he was kidnapped. When he was seven, he'd finally managed to escape. Marnie had found him and immediately called Dylan. The boy had been in terrible shape. The group that had killed his mom and dad and taken him hostage as just a toddler had been, much to Marnie's disconcertion, a group of witches and warlocks. Trevor had been forced to perform intense, draining magical feats of which Marnie was hardly capable, and been tortured if he did not succeed.

Eventually they'd gone back to Dylan's house, where Sophia, Jack, and baby Bailey were sleeping. Lizzy had quickly taken to Jack, wrapping him in a warm afghan and seating him in front of the fireplace with a mug of hot chocolate. She'd joined him with one of her own, and a plateful of s'more ingredients. Marnie and Dylan had watched from the kitchen as the boy settled, soon falling asleep against Lizzy, who carried him to the couch and gently laid him down before taking the dishes and coming to meet them. The decision that the most normal family, Dylan's, should be the one to take Jack in had been a simple matter of saying what everyone had been thinking for the past several hours aloud. The proceedings were finished fairly quickly. In a matter of perhaps a month, Jack Dawn had become Jack Dawn-Cornwell.

This did not mean there were no problems. Jack had been, as a side-effect of his experience, deathly afraid of magic. The boy was what you could call a tender hearted daredevil. He loved risk, and definitely took after his mom and his aunt Marnie in these respects. Unlike Dylan had been, Jack despised the idea of trying to be normal, mostly because he wasn't and, as Sophie had, Jack hated lies. Nevertheless, Jack simply couldn't deal with the magical aspect of his abnormality. The smallest spell could easily set him over the edge. Due to all of this, in the end Jack had attached himself to Elizabeth, the most normal person he could seem to find. Together, they avoided the enchanting world at their door.

Dylan stared at the pamphlet. After everything weird that he'd dealt with already, abnormality was still hunting him down. The comfortably average pretense, the normal life illusion, in which he shrouded himself once more fell down around him, as Dylan collapsed to the floor.


End file.
